1999 – 2009

I remember the 24th of August in 1999 as one of the days filled with pure energy to start something new. We were all hardcore gamers at the time, and started to think about what could be done to improve games and develop new ideas.

So on this special day, we decided to start the very first project of our own – a 3d first person shooter called Paradigm. Back then, we were not aware of it , but this was the first step of our meta-goal to learn how to develop games. And there were quite a few learning experiences waiting for us.

Philmap – Level Editor for Paradigm

Our idea was to develop everything on our own: a complete new game engine, all the necessary tools, an editor, artwork, level design, just everything. We built up a (hobby) team, some guys joined, some left later on. The typical forming stage.

Speaking of all the technology and tools we created in those years, I spent some time to dig for nostalgia screenshots. Philmap, the level editor for Paradigm, was actually one of the first editors to feature realtime lighting preview – a screenshot of it found its way to a Flipcode Image of the Day. It also had several plugins to make life easier for the designers, such as a stairs plugin.

Philmap – Stairs Plugin

Here are some more shots of various scenes in Paradigm.

Paradigm: Entrance Scene

Paradigm: Base Level Scene

Paradigm: Main Floor Scene

Paradigm: Base Level Exit

Later on, we switched technology quite a few times, ending up with Crystal Space as the 3d engine of choice and QuArK as level editor.

Another interesting project that we started somewhere in 2003 was a space shooter game codenamed Greedy Fly. Here are some concepts and shots of it.

Greedy Fly Concept: Ghost Ship

Greedy Fly Model: Ghost Ship

Greedy Fly: Ship F7P1

Greedy Fly: Ship armed with PlasmaGuns

VMC1 “soab”

Greedy Fly: Weapons mounted on a ship

We continued to gather experience in all fields of game development. That lead us to the ability to develop and produce Waterstorm completely on our own. The first concepts of Waterstorm saw the light in mid 2005, here are some examples.

Waterstorm Ship Concept: Abbys

Waterstorm Ship Model: Abbys

Waterstorm: Full Scene Concept

Waterstorm was actually the first project being released to the public and helped us getting a foot in the door of game business. We then continued to work on various other game ideas (I might post some more details on those as there is enough dust on the concept drawings) and did a lot of contract work, i.e. for Bongfish on the game Drop Point: Alaska.